US sweet potato production rose in 2009, with severe losses in some areas tempered by record yields elsewhere.
Despite massive losses in Mississippi due to excessive rains, production rose by seven per cent on 2009 and nine per cent on 2007, while yield per acre saw a record 11 per cent increase on last year.
The US department of agriculture’s National Agricultural Statistics Service said in its Crop Production 2009 Summary that around 19.6 million cwt (861kg) of sweet potatoes were produced across the country in 2009, harvesting 39 hectares.
North Carolina, which supplies much of the UK’s supply of sweet potato, set records for both production and yields in 2009. It produced 9.4m cwt, up eight per cent from 2008, while yield per acre was up 10 per cent.
But production in Mississippi fell from 3.4m to 1.3m cwt last year, as 20-25 per cent of the Mississippi crop had been harvested when rains started falling in mid-September. They continued for the next six weeks, with growers getting only one or two day breaks to get into fields.
Production in California jumped from 4.4m cwt to 5.9m cwt in 2009, while Louisiana also saw a production increase, from 1.1m cwt in 2008 to 1.6m last year.
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